Conventional wisdom suggested Jaguars general manager Dave Caldwell took a one-day break from his coaching search to spend time with his family in Atlanta and watch his former team face Seattle in an NFC playoff game.

That is correct. But also incomplete.

Three days before his interview with Seahawks defensive coordinator Gus Bradley, Caldwell’s process of finding Mike Mularkey’s replacement started at the Georgia Dome.

Instead of watching from the press box, Caldwell sat in the suite of Falcons general manager Thomas Dimitroff.

Instead of watching the Falcons, Caldwell concentrated on Bradley.

And instead of thinking about Atlanta’s victory, Caldwell was impressed at how the Seattle defense adjusted to nearly post a second-half shutout.

“I didn’t really tell anybody that,” he said Friday after Bradley was introduced at an EverBank Field news conference.

What Caldwell did tell everybody was hiring Bradley was a slam-dunk decision once they met for more than 12 hours on Wednesday.

The two men may have met once years before, when Caldwell was a scout for Indianapolis and Bradley an assistant coach at North Dakota State.

“No relationship whatsoever,” Caldwell said.

But during a set of talks that lasted more than 12 hours, Bradley had a tour de force interview that earned him a job offer and a four-year contract.

“After the day with Gus, I knew our visions were aligned,” Caldwell said. “It was an easy decision.”

“I didn’t want to cast a wide net,” Caldwell said. “I pretty much knew what I was looking for.”

■ Had San Francisco lost to Green Bay last Saturday, Caldwell said he “probably would have” reached out to 49ers offensive coordinator Greg Roman, his college roommate and presumed front-runner when the search began.

“We hadn’t talked in a couple of months — it’s not that we text or email a lot,” said Caldwell, who added that Roman didn’t reach out to him to remove himself from consideration.

■ The Jaguars were going to talk with Seattle offensive coordinator Darrell Bevell and possibly Atlanta special teams coordinator Keith Armstrong but decided on Bradley instead. Falcons defensive coordinator Mike Nolan was not a candidate.

“He was going to stay put,” Caldwell said of Nolan. “And what I was looking for was a first-time head coach.”

■ Caldwell and Bradley began the interview on Wednesday with a one-hour chat before being joined by owner Shad Khan and Jaguars president Mark Lamping.

“We rehashed the game on Sunday,” Caldwell said, referring to Atlanta’s win over Seattle.

The Jaguars’ interview was the third in five days for Bradley. He met briefly with the Philadelphia Eagles on Saturday night in Atlanta, had the playoff game and flight home Sunday, and flew from Seattle to Philadelphia on Tuesday morning to meet again with owner Jeffrey Lurie and general manager Howie Roseman.

Bradley said the sessions with the Eagles and the Jaguars were similar.

“It was the same type of questions, the same intensity,” he said. “You’re trying to find how the fit is. There are some deep questions. I went into the mind-set [with the Jaguars interview], if it was seven or eight hours or three hours, that I’m a huge Jacksonville fan and I’m going to give them my heart and soul and we’re going to know at the end if it was a good fit.”

Said Caldwell: “Nothing really surprised me [about Bradley]. We had a lot of similar thoughts on how we wanted this to be built.”

Providing confidence for Bradley was that he had nothing to lose — if he didn’t get a head-coaching job, he was heading back to a young Seattle defense that was lights out down the stretch. He could provide his plan and if teams liked it, great; if not, fine. But the longer he talked about the Jaguars to Caldwell, the more he wanted to be a part of the rebuild.

“If it didn’t work out, I was going back to a great place,” Bradley said. “It had to be something that in my mind was a good match. Once I was in the building and through the whole process, it was a no-brainer. I’m telling you, it was that easy.”

Anyway, no drug, not even alcohol, causes the fundamental ills of society. If we're looking for the source of our troubles, we shouldn't test people for drugs, we should test them for stupidity, ignorance, greed and love of power. P.J. O'Rourke

941 points

Grendel53

Saturday, January 19, 2013 @ 1:30 am

Arrow pointing upwards. Let's go Jags.
I hope they are smiling like that at next year's end of season press conference.